Only 55-64 year olds who are high-risk and uninsured and don't need subsidies...

[Eric J in MN]

...would be able to buy-into Medicare.

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/health-care/howard-dean-senate-health-care-deal-contains-real-reform/

In one provision that liberals will dislike, (Howard) Dean said he’d been told that the Medicare buy-in for people 55-64 would not have subsidies, potentially making the buy in unaffordable for many intended recipients. Dean said that if this isn’t fixed in conference negotiations, it could be a deal-breaker.

“That’s a huge problem that may tip this into being not real reform,” Dean said.

Dean confirmed what I reported here yesterday: The Medicare buy-in will be available as early as 2010, a provision he hailed for substantive and political reasons. “They’re making government-run single payer available to people under 65,” he said. “That’s a step in the right direction.”

Dean added, however, that it was unclear as of yet whether the early buy-in applied to all those without insurance or just those at high-risk (I was told yesterday that the latter was true). He said that if it’s high-risk only, that could also be a provision that falls short of real reform, and noted that the early buy-in would have to be made available to everybody.

[leeroysphitz]

1. As far as I am concerned the "deal" has already been broken. A while ago in fact.

And this "buy-in" BS isn't fooling anybody.

Kill it.

[enid602]

2. high risk

What do we have to do to become 'high risk'? Smoking? Drugs? Unprotected sex? I´m on board.

[Eric J in MN]

5. You have to be denied coverage for a pre-exisiting condition to be "high-risk"...

...and that will be illegal in 2013, anyway, and so no one will be high-risk after 2013 if they stick with that definition.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/health/july-dec09/highrisk_10-05.html

[enid602]

11. 2013

I just hope those uninsured, high risk people can stick it out until 2013

[Eric J in MN]

15. There will be a high-risk pool for the transition period.

http://www.californiahealthline.org/road-to-reform/2009/senate-plan-for-highrisk-pools-likely-a-mixed-bag-for-california.aspx

[Hassin Bin Sober]

13. Wanna get a room?

:)

[GodlessBiker]

3. Wouldn't you want some relatively healthy people to "buy in," too?

I mean, it would help make the program a little more solvent.

[slipslidingaway]

8. I would, the insurance companies get to keep the most profitable ...

segment who are mandated to buy their products.

:shrug:

[GodlessBiker]

12. Yep. Another form of corporate welfare.

[slipslidingaway]

26. Yes, we need to carefully think through any loopholes to this new idea. n/t

[flyarm]

4. CWA Slams Senate Health Care Bill: “Would Make our Health Care System Worse”

CWA Slams Senate Health Care Bill: “Would Make our Health Care System Worse”

http://workinprogress.firedoglake.com/2009/11/20/cwa-slams-senate-health-care-bill/

CWA Slams Senate Health Care Bill: “Would Make our Health Care System Worse”


By: Michael Whitney Friday November 20, 2009

The Communications Workers of America just put out a statement hitting the Senate health care bill, specifically slamming the regressive excise tax on health care plans. Their statement (emphasis mine):

The Senate bill’s proposal to tax health care benefits would make our health care system worse, not better. This new tax, which is opposed by the majority of Americans, would affect millions of families. Average families who clearly don’t have “Cadillac” health care plans would owe thousands of dollars in new taxes.

Taxing health care benefits is a bad public policy that would hit millions of families hard as employers cut back health care benefits to avoid the tax. The idea that this tax will curtail rising premiums is just wrong.

CWA supports health care reform that is fairly financed, and the House bill has a better approach. It fully funds health care reform by making large employers pay toward their workers’ coverage, adding a modest surtax on the wealthiest Americans and including a public option.

CWA will work with Senate Majority Leader Reid and other Senators to produce a bill that will provide the real health care reform that working and middle income families deserve.

Those are strong words from one of the country’s most influential unions, going beyond the AFL-CIO’s tepid praise and SEIU’s lauding of the Senate for the bill. CWA was part of an ad pushed by AFL-CIO member unions last month hitting the same excise tax in the Senate Finance Committee bill, but appears to have gone one step further than other major unions with this statement.

[Neecy]

10. I have a sister who's a CWA member

She has a very good health care plan - not great, like member of Congress get - but very good. The whole health care debate really didn't catch her attention until she found out that her plan may be heavily taxed to pay for this "reform", ie, her taxes will go directly to the subsidies that will end up in the pockets of insurance company executives and their shareholders. This finally got her attention.

[flyarm]

23. we are all being fleeced..this is just an insurance corp bailout

on the young and old, the ill and well folks..the youth is really going to get it in the backside..and they don't even know it yet!

But remember those even here at DU ..you know them ..the DLC'ers or those on the take that keep promising you a grand chess game!!..it is a chess game of fucking you and everyone in this country!

I will say it again..there are no two parties any longer..just one big party with one big giant money pot in the middle and you are not invited to their party!

[Kokonoe]

24. If insurance companies are forced to cover all sick people.

Everyone would have a "cadillac" plan. Republicans want this HCR more than anybody. Fool em twice and you can't get fooled again.:rofl:

[Cleita]

6. I believe that is why they are extending Medicaid as well, that would

cover those who can't buy in. However, the final bill hasn't been finished yet so we still have of time to write and phone it about it.

[flyarm]

21. firedoglake is all over this.........

firedoglake is all over this.........


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2009/12/09/the-public-option-“deal”-that-does-not-sound-like-it-is-even-a-deal-yet/

Public Option “Deal” Does Not Yet Sound Like It is Even a Deal

By: Jon Walker Wednesday December 9, 2009

What is in this deal that might not be a deal? The answer is that I don’t really know, and it seems like most of the Democratic senators don’t even know yet.

Medicare Buy-In

It sounds like the vague outline of the deal includes an early Medicare buy-in for some subset of people between the age of 55-64. (Whether this is a buy in for Medicare or for Conrad’s fake Medicare is not yet determined.) It at least sounds like this program might not be just a temporary stopgap, and will start in 2011.

That buy-in option would initially be made available to some uninsured people aged 55-64 in 2011, three years before the exchanges open. For the period between 2011 and 2014, when the exchanges do open, the Medicare option will not be subsidized–people will have to pay in without federal premium assistance–and so will likely be quite expensive, the aide noted. However, after the exchanges launch, the Medicare option would be offered in the exchanges, where people could pay into it with their subsidies.

Remember, the exchanges, at first, will only be open to roughly 10% of Americans, so it is only a very small group of 55-64 year olds who would have the option of buying in to Medicare. With this provision, the devil really is in the details. It could be done well, or it could easily devolve into a worthless Medicare buy-in in name only.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

7. Well, that would screw me. I couldn't afford it without subsidies.

It's ok, my local government will have to shovel away my body when they find it dead in the street...... Feds won't even have to pay for that.

[Nite Owl]

9. If it is only high risk

then it probably passed the demcons approval because the insurance companies don't want these people anyway, they would actually need medical care.

[NightWatcher]

14. get the government to pay for the "high risk" and the private co.'s will screw the well

with relatively NO payouts.
If all the healthy people are mandated to pay for coverage only after all the "high risk" are gone from the pool.....

Wow, they arent even using lube anymore are they? BOHICA

[debbierlus]

16. Pathetic, isn't it.

[Oregone]

17. I await all the juicy details, but this is only a good idea so long as...

ANY 55+ person could enroll and they get the same subsidies as they would if they entered the exchange. Otherwise, these Congressmen could go fuck themselves.

[Waiting For Everyman]

18. It's just like the bank bailout...

They take the profits on our dime, and we take the losses.

[newspeak]

20. my in-laws

just got a notice from their secondary health insurance provider. They were paying about 800.00 for secondary insurance-now it's going to be about a thousand. The excuse in the letter for increasing the amount was that the new medicare bill (no bill has been passed yet) is going to cost more for the company. My in-laws cannot afford to have insurance, and they spend most of their money on this secondary insurance. These insurance companies are like vampires, sucking the blood out of those who need it most for a profit. I'm sick of it.

[tonysam]

19. That figures. A LOT of people in that age group, maybe the majority,

are still healthy and have no chronic health problems. So people like me are screwed.

[flyarm]

22. Public Option Grand Compromise Becomes A Grand Big Nothing

Public Option Grand Compromise Becomes A Grand Big Nothing
By: Jon Walker Tuesday December 8, 2009
snip;
For starters, the Medicaid expansion has completely been dropped, even though it would have been a big money saver for the government:

This afternoon, Jay Rockefeller said that the new proposal to expand Medicaid coverage for those who are 133% to 150% above the federal poverty line was dropped during a meeting of key legislators this morning. “I was sad this morning,” Rockefeller told me and a few other reporters. “We walked in, and it was 133<%> to 140<%>, then it’s staying at 133… So we didn’t get anything.”

Now we are getting reports that the Medicare buy-in is not really a buy-in. . . or really Medicare. Senators are looking at restricting the Medicare buy-in so completely that it will be an option for almost no one. It will likely only be for a very tiny segment of poor and very unhealthy 55-64 year-olds:

Negotiators are considering limiting consumers to those who would qualify for high-risk insurance pools already set up under the Senate’s health care legislation. This would mean primarily those who have been uninsured for a certain amount of time, have a history of poor health or are unable to get insurance because of a preexisting condition.

Adding insult to injury, the “Medicare” this tiny fraction of people could buy in to might end up not even really being Medicare:

Conrad said that he’d propose having the Medicare buy-in be treated as “a separate pool” that could have negotiated rates, rather than those set by the existing Medicare program.


http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2009/12/08/public-option-grand-compromise-becomes-a-grand-big-nothing/

[ipaint]

25. There was never going to be a public option.

Not even a sliver. Happy holidays.